The Jade God by Alan Sullivan (snow like ashes series txt) 📕

all, but infinitely removed. Derrick stared at the two girls. Edith’s arms were still round Jean, but their eyes were fixed on what lay on the floor. Jean looked at the man she loved. The terror was leaving her face, being replaced by a vast incomprehensible wonder mingled with a profound pity. In that moment she was his, and yet unspeakably distant. It was like traversing a forest of dreadful shadows and emerging, suddenly blinded, into the light, where one had to find oneself before seeing anything else. A great pity enveloped her altogether. She came quickly forward and knelt beside the still form.

“Jack, you must ask the sergeant to permit that. Don’t you understand? One poor woman among all these men,” she whispered. “Oh, the poor, poor soul!”

Burke nodded. “Perhaps that will be all right, miss,” he broke in with a queer, deep gruffness. “We’ll let it go at that, but I’ll have to send a man up to stay outside till morning. He won’t come into the cottage. Is there anything you want to say, Mr. Derrick, before⁠—”

Derrick shook his head. “I think it has all been said.”

The sergeant touched Martin’s shoulder. “Will you⁠—” He glanced at the body. “Blunt goes with me.”

Martin nodded speechlessly. With infinite tenderness he picked up his wife as though she had been a child and, staring straight ahead with unseeing eyes, strode through the door which her lifeless hand had so recently opened for him. Then into the hall alone with his burden. The others heard the front door open and close, and after that the sound of slow feet on the gravel. This dwindled. Burke stepped across to where the peddler lay on his side and snapped on a handcuff. At the ring of metal, Derrick felt his eyes suddenly drawn to the jade god.

The thing still rested, the light soaking into its emerald depths, and it seemed that on the tiny features rested a smile of sardonic satisfaction, as though it had known it all, and all the time. What was any individual tragedy, what was this minute portion of the great human drama, with the pangs of a moment, to the profound acquaintanceship with evil that lay hidden here? These actors were only discharging their parts in an endless play that would continue with its constantly changing scenes so long as humanity could feel passion and anger and fear and revenge. Derrick stared at the image and vowed silently that, come what might of his act, this reign of terror would soon end. But here was neither the time nor the place. He made a gesture to Edith, and the latter slipped her arm into that of Jean. When he knew they had reached Edith’s room, Derrick turned to Burke.

“I want to speak to you a minute.”

The sergeant crooked a finger at Blunt and led him into the hall. Again the clink of metal, and the peddler was anchored to a massive chair. The big man came back, smiling grimly.

“That’s a useful dodge when you think of it. Now, what about this image? Hadn’t I better take it to the station for the present?”

Derrick shook his head. “If you don’t mind, I’d rather keep it till it happens to be needed.” There followed a little pause, while through both their brains ran the swift wonder of the night. “I suppose,” he added, “there’s no objection to that.”

Burke grinned. “No, sir; matter of fact, I’m not in love with the ugly thing myself. It worked, didn’t it? that plan of yours,” he went on respectfully, “but not just in the way either of us expected. Who would ever have thought it? As for that poor woman, why, there’s only one explanation.”

“What’s that?”

Burke put a significant finger to his forehead.

“Look here,” said Derrick suddenly, “I want to know something. What’s the next move, now that the matter is in your hands?”

“There’s the inquest, perhaps tomorrow, but maybe the day after. It depends on Dr. Henry.”

“And then?”

“The trial of Blunt and Martin, of course.”

“Just what will they be tried for?”

“Housebreaking, attempted theft, and possible complicity in the murder of Mr. Millicent.”

“Then take Martin first. He did not break into this house. I sent for him.”

“That may be true, sir, but you can’t say that for the other fellow, and they seem to be in pretty close touch and to have worked together.” Burke paused and looked puzzled. “I don’t very well see how they can be separated in this affair, judging by what you’ve said yourself in the last day or two.”

“Suppose, sergeant,” said Derrick thoughtfully, “that I should decide not to lay any charge against Blunt after all.”

The big man blinked. “I don’t quite follow you, sir. What’s to be gained by acting like that?”

“I can’t say yet, but do you honestly think there’s any chance of really proving anything serious now against these two men?”

“There’s a good working chance, but I fancy a jury would be as much puzzled as we’ve been, and probably more. You never can tell about a jury.”

“Then I particularly ask that no charge be laid against either of them till I have had a talk with both. I admit, and you’ve said it, too, that all our suspicions were wrong and unfounded. We were working hard, but only playing about on the edge of the truth. Now we have heard a confession of the act from lips where we never expected to find it, and the person who committed the murder has gone before another court. Our discovery, which has led to this, was a matter of chance, and we were on a false trail from the start.”

“I admit that, sir, but you did all the guessing. The only thing we had in common was our suspicion of Martin.”

“That’s true, and I’ll shoulder whatever blame attaches to it. But, officially, the net result is that you have cleared up the mystery of the Millicent murder, and after everyone else had failed. You mustn’t forget, sergeant, that so far